The Racial Politics of Mass Incarceration

• In Event: 033 - Section on Crime, Law, and Deviance Roundtable Session and Business Meeting
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 02. Punishment and Incarceration 2

Abstract

Existing accounts of mass incarceration, whether they emphasize the machinations of elites or the demands of non-elites, commit themselves to a variety of claims about the role of the African-American community in either supporting or resisting the punitive turn. These claims bear on any evaluation of the trajectory of criminal justice policy over the last thirty years, but, as is readily acknowledged, existing evidence is unsystematic and often anecdotal. We simply do not know enough about what African-Americans thought and especially about what their elected representatives did once in office. This paper seeks to correct this deficit by examining the trajectory of black public opinion in a variety of domains in more detail than has previously been done, and estimating the impact of black elected officials on carceral outcomes. We find that the reaction of the African-American community has been marked by contrasting impulses: as victims of the carceral state, they have expressed significantly less punitive views than whites; but as victims of crime, they have been very and increasingly concerned about public order. We also find that, contrary to conventional wisdom, our best evidence suggests that the influx of their representatives into office has exacerbated punitive outcomes.

Authors

• Adaner Usmani, New York University

• John J Clegg, NYU